For Pete's Sake COMPLETE
by Lexwing
Summary: I wanted to write a story with Pete front and center (hence the title of this little piece) but of course other Smallville characters appear, too.
1. Default Chapter

For Pete's Sake: Ch. 1 Category: Drama Time: Pre-"Shattered" Rating: PG-13 for mile language and adult themes I wanted to write a story with Pete front and center (hence the title of this little piece) but of course other Smallville characters appear, too. More chapters will follow if there's enough interest. Feedback welcome and appreciated. All Superman characters property of the WB/DC Comics. As I always say, please don't sue the starving graduate student. (  
  
The night had settled like a dark blanket over Smallville. In Metropolis, three hours to the east, the skyscrapers and neon signs kept the city bright even at midnight, but here in the country there was nothing but the moon and stars to light the autumn sky. And tonight there was no moon.  
A car screeched to a halt on the Loeb Bridge, the tires leaving streaks of black rubber on the concrete. The driver's side door opened, and there were sounds of a scuffle as he or she reached back into the interior of the vehicle, emerging with a rolled-up coat. The driver strode to the edge of the bridge and chucked the bundle into the dark water below.  
The waterproof jacket didn't sink. Instead it bobbed along in the darkness. With most of the spring and summer rain still dammed up behind Morley Reservoir the Small River was at the lowest it had been all year.  
The coat floated downstream on the slow current. Wrapped tightly inside its unwitting occupant snuffled and blinked blurrily up at the sky as it was carried away from all it had ever know.  
  
Clark rolled over and opened his eyes to an orange ceiling.  
Orange?  
He blinked a few times and then remembered: he was staring up at the ceiling of a tent. The Ross family's old tent to be exact-much loved and much used by the five Ross children.  
He pulled himself out of his sleeping bag and shivered slightly. He had slept in his clothes. October in Kansas wasn't exactly Alaska, but the nights could still get pretty darn cold. To warm his blood Clark stood up and stuffed his stocking feet into his boots without bothering to lace them.  
Across the tent Pete's sleeping bag was already neatly rolled back up and stowed away, just like their dads had taught them.  
"Show-off," Clark grumbled to no one in particular as he bent his six- foot-plus frame down to squeeze through the tent flap.  
Pete was feeding sticks to the fire they'd carefully banked the night before and looked up at him with a wide grin.  
"Some farm boy you are," he laughed. "It's six a.m. already."  
"Give me a break, Pete-I'm on vacation." Clark sniffed the air carefully. "You didn't try to make coffee, did you?"  
Pete held up a thermos. "Nah. Lana hooked me up before we left. I just reheated it."  
"Well, better reheated Talon coffee than no coffee at all." Clark fished two tin cups out of the camping supplies and held them out for Pete to fill.  
This was real camping: he and Pete had packed in everything they needed, and they would pack everything out and try to leave the woods as they had found them. Of course, Clark could have carried in a lot more, but Pete had insisted this be a "powers-free" camping trip.  
The boys drank their coffee and debated over what to make for breakfast.  
"We could catch some more fish." Clark offered.  
"For breakfast? Ugh. Let's make pancakes. All we have to do is add water to the mix."  
Clark took another swig of coffee. "No syrup."  
Pete rooted around in the backpack of food supplies and produced a plastic container.  
"Jam."  
When Clark still hesitated Pete waggled the container back and forth.  
"It's you mom's. Strawberry."  
Clark grinned. "You talked me into it."  
They worked in companionable silence. Clark stirred up the pancake batter and set them to fry in an iron skillet while Pete started dismantling the tent.  
Clark took a depth breath of the woodsy, moss-scented air and sighed. He wished they could stay out longer, but his folks needed him back on the farm. He knew his parents' didn't begrudge him this forty-eight hour reprieve from daily life-in fact they had insisted on it. But Clark would start feeling guilty if he didn't get home to help with the harvest.  
And he already felt guilty enough. The camping trip had been an annual tradition for the Ross and Kent families as far back as Clark could remember. Usually they would go for a week, sometimes longer. The last two summers their folks had let them go on their own.  
But this summer Clark hadn't been around to go camping. Instead he'd run off to Metropolis. Granted, he hadn't exactly been in his right mind at the time, but Pete had been the one person he hadn't even attempted to contact.  
Pete hadn't said a word about it. He and Clark had picked up right where they'd left off-one of the benefits of being friends with someone for almost twelve years. But Clark still wondered if somewhere, deep down, Pete was angry with him. It was hard to tell with Pete: he always seemed so easy-going.  
But had Clark decided not to push things. The boys ate their breakfast in companionable silence, listing to the wind in the trees. They settled the age-old question of who had to do the dishes in their usual way- rock, paper, scissors. And, as usual, Clark lost.  
Pete smiled as he handed Clark his sticky plate and cup.  
"I like my dishes extra sparkly."  
"Shut up," Clark said good-naturedly. "That tent better be down and stowed by the time I'm done, or you're packing it back out of here."  
"You just worry about dishpan hands, man, and leave the tent to me," Pete shot back.  
Clark gathered up the cooking utensils and walked the dozen or so yards down to the river. It wasn't moving too fast today, but he still trod carefully along the edge where the sand was damp and squishy.  
They had chosen to camp just above a bend in the river, and Clark moved a little downstream to find a dry patch of sand. He had just bent down to start scouring the skillet with sand like his father had taught him when he caught sight of something pink. Something was wedged in some brambles a few feet away, where the water was shallow.  
He hated to admit it, but anything pink still reminded him of his girlfriend-or ex-girlfriend-or, heck, Clark wasn't exactly sure where the two of them stood now. And, like the situation with Pete, he had only himself to blame.  
But he still stood up, brushed off his hands, and walked over to fish whatever it was out of the river. Only before he could reach it, it moved.  
Clark jumped several feet back, half-expecting something horrible to come slithering out of the old coat it had obviously made its home. But nothing did.  
Instead Clark approached more cautiously, scanning with his x-ray vision what he could now see was a girl's jacket.  
"Pete!"  
It wasn't an animal. It was human. He could even see what seemed like a ridiculously tiny heart beating quickly inside a tiny ribcage.  
"Pete!" He hollered again. Above him several birds, started out of sleep, took flight.  
Behind him he could hear Pete's sneakers crunching through the underbrush as he arrived, breathless from running. When he saw Clark standing there he made a face.  
"Clark, man, don't yell like that! You gave me a serious 'Deliverance' flashback."  
"Pete, there's something alive in there." Clark pointed at the bundle at his feet.  
Pete scowled, his dark eyebrows lowering ominously. "Yeah? Like a dog or something? Man, people are such jerks! Old man Bates once tried to drown this whole litter of kittens but my dad caught him."  
"No, Pete," Clark felt strangely numb. "It's not a dog, or a cat. I looked at it, and it looks, well.human."  
"Human?" Pete stared at him blankly. "What do you mean, 'human'?"  
"Human. Like.human."  
"Oh, jeez." Pete looked ill. "Is it.alive?"  
"Uh huh. I think so."  
Pete looked at him like he was an idiot. "Why didn't you say so?" Pete sprang into motion, unhooking the jacket from where it had snagged on the fallen branches and lifting it carefully onto the sand.  
"Pete, there's blood on the jacket."  
"I see it, Clark." The arms of the jacket had been knotted around the body inside of it, and Pete wrested to untie the wet fabric. A moment later he pulled it loose, and took a cautious look inside. A second later he nodded at Clark.  
"It's definitely human. And it looks ok."  
Clark hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath. "Are you sure?"  
"I think so. It's looking back at me like it wants to know how the heck it got here."  
Cautiously Clark glanced over his friend's shoulder. The lining of the jacket was silver, and lying against it was a very, very small baby.  
It had the smallest arms and legs Clark had ever seen, and its head seemed out of proportion to the rest of its body. It moved its limbs jerkily, like it didn't have control over them yet, but Pete was right: it had fixed its rather unfocused gaze on the two boys.  
"Clark, give me your jacket," Pete ordered.  
The tone was so unlike his childhood friend that Clark complied without thinking. Pete carefully lifted up the infant and rolled it into Clark brown barn jacket. The baby's head flopped slightly to one side before Pete steadied it.  
"This kid is really young, Clark," Pete said softly. "Like, weeks, maybe. It's lucky it didn't die of exposure out here all alone."  
"Yeah, lucky," Clark echoed.  
The two of them stared at the dark red smears on the outside of the pink jacket for a long moment before Clark spoke again.  
"Pete. I don't think that baby got here by accident."  
"No, I don't think so either."  
"So what do we do?"  
"We get the heck out of here before whoever dumped it comes back to finish the job."  
  
"Hang in there, kiddo," Pete crooned softly to the unknown baby. "As soon as Clark gets back the three of us are out of here."  
He knew there was no way the baby understood him, but he also had enough nieces and nephews to know that you had to stay calm and speak quietly around infants. Like dogs and bees, they could smell fear.  
And if any kid had a reason to smell fear, it was this one.  
Clark had insisted on tracking up and down the river a ways, worried that the parents might be around, might be injured, might be waiting for help to arrive.  
Pete knew that was wishful thinking, but he let his friend look anyway. Clark could move fast enough that it wouldn't really make a difference, and he'd seemed so freaked out that Pete thought it was better if he was out of the way.  
The baby snuffled again, the sound muffled against Pete's sweatshirt. He'd tucked it into his own coat and zipped it up so that only the top of the kid's head showed. All it had had on was a soggy diaper.  
Was that why someone had wrapped it in that pink coat? Pete had insisted they leave the coat where they'd found it, but he couldn't help but wonder why, if someone had been trying to get rid of the baby, they hadn't just thrown in into the water by itself.  
Unless they'd been trying to get rid of the bloodstained jacket, too.  
Nearby a twig snapped, and Pete swung his head around quickly. The forest that had always seemed so welcoming now seemed dark and ominous, and Pete's heart started beating quicker.  
"Man, I hate this," he grumbled to his small companion. Pete's mother was a judge, but before that she had been a prosecutor for Lowell County. His parents had always tried to shield Pete and his siblings from the dark side of their mother's job, but Pete had heard enough growing up to know that terrible things could happen even in a bucolic place like Smallville. And that was before the meteor freaks had started showing up.  
It was all well and good for Clark-Clark couldn't be hurt. He could move through the world fearlessly, his only risk that of discovery.  
Pete couldn't. When Pete hit a car windshield, his bones broke. When he was thrown into walls, he got concussions. Not real heroic, but he still tried to make a difference when and where he could.  
He knew Clark did everything he could, but still.he was only one guy.  
But this was beyond meteor freaks. Pete still couldn't quite wrap his head around all the horrible events that might have led to the baby being left to die in the river.  
He looked down at the small head. The baby, lulled by the warmth of his body, had gone to sleep, but Pete didn't expect that to last for long. He felt an odd surge of protectiveness.  
"You've got nothing to worry about now," he promised aloud. "I'll make sure nothing happens to you. You've got my word on it, ok? And like my dad always says, a man's only worth as much as his word."  
In his heart, however, Pete silently hoped he could live up to his promise.  
  
Several hundred yards away, a crouching figure held her breath until she was sure the boy hadn't heard her movements. The snapping twig had nearly given away her position.  
As a taller, dark-haired boy appeared in the clearing she shook her head. She has been considering rushing the smaller boy, but now the odds were against such a strategy.  
She would just have to bide her time until another opportunity presented itself.  
And it would. Eventually. 


	2. Ch 2

"I still don't know if this is a good idea, Pete." Clark stared down at the baby, still asleep but now snugly ensconced in an empty bushel basket.  
They were in Pete's kitchen, and Clark could only thank his lucky stars that Dale and Abigail Ross were gone on a second honeymoon to the Caribbean. He didn't even want to know what they might have said had they seen him and Pete walking across the field behind the Ross home with a baby as well as a load of camping equipment. As it was, Clark could practically hear his parents' voices in his head, admonishing him to call the police, to take the baby into town, to do anything other than listen to Pete.  
But Clark kept his mouth shut as Pete continued.  
"Look, Clark, for all we know whoever dumped this kid will come back to make sure he or she finished the job. You saw the blood on that jacket, same as I did."  
"Yeah, but maybe.I dunno." Clark rubbed a hand across his chin. "I keep thinking there has to be a logical explanation."  
"This from a guy who used to keep a spaceship in his backyard."  
"Storm cellar," Clark absently corrected.  
True, he had followed the river back upstream as far as the LuthorCorp plant, and hadn't seen anything unusual. He knew that if the kid had been lost accidentally there would have been search parties combing the area. But he still couldn't believe someone would be so malicious, so, well, evil, as to abandon a baby.  
Maybe that was because he'd had some personal experience with being abandoned. Only from what little he'd learned about his home world his parents probably hadn't had a choice. But surely whoever had done this could have found another option.  
"Clark, I'm not saying we don't go to the police at all. Just not yet. Not until we know the coast is clear, and she'll be safe in foster care or whatever the authorities decide to with her."  
Clark raised his eyebrows. "It's a she?"  
"Yeah, I finally had to break down and change her while you were stowing the gear. Definitely a girl," Pete grinned.  
Clark was tempted to reach out and touch the baby, but he didn't dare. He could throw around hundred-pound hay bales like they were matchsticks. But he wasn't very good with small, delicate things. Better he leave that to Pete, who at least had a vague idea of what he was doing around infants.  
"Twenty-four hours, Pete," Clark finally said. "Twenty-four hours to make sure no one's coming after her, and then we go to Sheriff Adams. Deal?"  
"Deal." Pete smoothed the jacket that still covered the baby.  
Clark cleared his throat. "So.what first?"  
"First, we find something to put on her head so she stays warm. She's as bald as Lex Luthor. And, second, you go into town and see if anyone's looking for a missing baby."  
  
"Clark?"  
At the sound of the voice behind him Clark jumped. He whirled around to find his friend and editor Chloe Sullivan standing behind him.  
"Jeez, Clark, I thought camping was supposed to be relaxing," she protested.  
"Uh, yeah, well." Clark couldn't think up a witty retort. He usually couldn't around Chloe. Her mind-not to mention her tongue--moved too fast.  
  
"I thought you and Pete wouldn't be back from playing macho men until tonight," Chloe tried again.  
"It got a little too cold for camping," Clark finally offered. He'd come into the Talon to see if he could pick up any news, his third stop after Dosse's Café and the corner newsstand. Nothing. So much for his 'lost baby' theory.  
He was momentarily tempted to enlist Chloe's help, but Pete's warning still rang in his ears.  
"Clark, you know I love Chloe, I do," Pete had vowed. "But that girl has a mouth as wide as the Grand Canyon. This kid would be front-page news before her next diaper change. No Chloe, Clark. No way."  
Clark could already see Chloe's reporter antennae on alert, and he quickly changed the subject.  
"So, did we miss anything?"  
Chloe snorted. "In this berg? Nada. Some kids took advantage of fall break from classes to soap some widows over on Elm. A liquor store over in Granville got knocked over, and the Luthors bought another hundred acres for some new housing development-Misty Acres, or Windy Poplars, or something nauseating like that. And the county grain elevators are getting ready for a bumper crop of corn. Exciting stuff, no?"  
"Exciting," Clark smiled. He never needed the Ledger with Chloe around.  
"And if you're looking for Lana she had a meeting with her paper cup supplier." Chloe looked at him steadily.  
"Nope, I wasn't looking for Lana."  
For once Clark was telling the truth. At the moment he was preoccupied with another girl, only this one weighed about ten pounds and currently was wearing one of Pete's rolled-up sweatsocks on her head.  
"OK, then," Chloe seized his arm. "You can buy me a cappuccino and tell me all about your exciting sojourn with Mother Nature."  
Clark took a quick glance at his watch. He'd promised to spell Pete for a while with the kid before he headed home, but one cup of coffee wouldn't hurt. And in the meantime he'd try to think of some underhanded way to pick Chloe's brain about missing persons cases and the obstruction of justice.  
As they placed their order he wondered idly if the police would have him doing time when they found out he and Pete had willingly withheld evidence about a possible-probable--crime. They'd done it before, of course, but so far they'd gotten away with it.  
With a human being as the evidence, however, that wasn't going to be possible this time.  
But, he mused, at least when Sheriff Adams or his parents killed him he'd have some caffeine in his system.  
  
"Lana? Is that you?" Chloe's voice called out.  
"Yes." Lana Lang pulled off her blazer as she climbed the stairs of the Sullivan house. At the top of she struck her head into the first bedroom on the right. Chloe had painted it a bright cherry red and decorated it with political posters and newspaper clippings. The room's owner was curled on her bed, busily typing away on her laptop.  
"Hey, Chloe, what's up?"  
"How'd your meeting go?"  
Lana shrugged. "How exciting can disposable coffee cups be? Paper or plastic? Waxed or unwaxed? Whee."  
"Yeah, well, Clark stopped by the Talon. He was acting weird."  
Lana raised her eyebrows. "Weird for anyone or weird for Clark?"  
Chloe scooted to the edge of her sari-covered bed and stretched. "Weird for Clark. He was asking me about missing person's cases. Do you know if something's up I should know about?"  
Lana bit back her smile. Chloe considered everything that happened in Smallville her business, especially if it involved Clark.  
"Nope. He hasn't said anything to me. All I know is Pete was really psyched about their camping trip when he came by yesterday. I think he's been feeling kinda neglected. I mean, Clark hangs out with me at the Talon, and with you at the Torch, but he and Pete don't seem as close as they used to be."  
"Lana, just because they aren't attached at the elbow anymore doesn't mean Pete's being neglected," Chloe snorted. "And now that Lex is in Metropolis during the week Clark has no choice but to hang with us."  
"Gee, thanks, Chloe."  
"You know what I mean."  
Lana frowned thoughtfully. "If Clark has a problem he's more likely to keep it to himself than come to either of us."  
"That's the truth." Chloe picked up her laptop and moved it over to her small, cluttered desk. "I still get the feeling something's going on I should know about. But I guess I should wait until he comes to me, huh?"  
Lana smiled. "I would."  
But of course she knew perfectly well Chloe wasn't going to wait for Clark to bear his soul to her. That just wouldn't be Chloe Sullivan.  
  
Clark watched his parents from under his lashes as the three of them ate breakfast.  
It was four thirty in the morning, and the sun was only now starting to show pale yellow over the horizon, but a long day of work stretched ahead of them.  
Harvest time always sucked. Everything seemed to hit at once: corn to be harvested, threshed, and stacked; vegetables that had to come out of the ground before the first frost; repairs that had to be made to the house and barn before winter came.it was enough to make Clark seriously reconsider the value of farm life.  
As his parents refilled their coffee mugs and Clark shoveled a few more pancakes onto his plate he was tempted to beg off work so he would go check on Pete and the baby.  
Clark still had that gnawing sense of unease in the pit of his stomach about keeping the secret from his parents. He just kept telling himself that tonight time would be up, and he and Pete could call the police and hand the baby over to the proper authorities.  
Besides, she and Pete had been doing just fine when Clark had left them. Pete's parents kept a small stash of baby supplies around them house for their various grandchildren, and he and Clark had managed to get the baby fed and changed again before Clark had had to rush home. Fortunately she wasn't a very demanding kid, because Clark honestly didn't know what they might have done if she had started screaming or spitting up. But she had seemed perfectly happy at the Ross house, and Pete seemed perfectly happy to take care of her. That had puzzled Clark a little, because he knew for a fact Pete always tried to duck out of babysitting his numerous nieces and nephews. But Pete had just shrugged and explained that this was different.  
"Clark, I think we should start out in the back forty, get as much done as we can before it gets too late in the day," his father said, breaking into Clark's thoughts. "Can you manage without the tractor until I get it out there?"  
It was a running joke in the Kent house that Clark could get half an acre down and ready for threshing by the time the family's rusty old tractor could rumble out into the fields. And he could, but Jonathan Kent figured they might as well use the tractor, too.  
"Then I need you with me in the vegetable garden, Clark," his mother added with a smile. "We need to get the last of the pumpkins down into the root cellar."  
"OK, Mom." Inwardly, however, Clark sighed-so much for his vacation. While his friends could spend their Fall Break at the Talon or the movies he would spend his up to his eyeballs in corn. And somewhere in there he needed to sneak in another call to Pete.  
As if conjured by his mind he heard a squeal of tires and a second later Pete's old car swung to a stop in front of the Kent house.  
"What in the.?" Jonathan Kent asked.  
Clark stood, but Pete was already out of his car and pounding up the steps of the Kent porch.  
Martha Kent rushed to open to screen door. "Pete, goodness, what's wrong? Are you all right?"  
Jonathan stood and tossed his napkin on the table. "Pete, you know better than to drive like that! What's gotten in to you?"  
But Clark quickly noted the white lines of stress around his friend's mouth and the expression of fear in Pete's dark eyes.  
"What happened?"  
"She's gone, Clark. Rose is gone."  
Clark tried to pretend both his parents weren't staring at him. "Who's Rose?"  
"The baby, Clark. She's gone. Somebody took her." 


	3. Ch 3

"OK, boys, let's go over this one more time."  
Pete knotted his hands in his lap and stared across the table at Sheriff Adams.  
"Look, we need to be out there looking for Rose! She could be anywhere by now!"  
He'd never felt so frustrated in his life. He'd woken up to check on the kid he'd named 'Rose' (because it sounded better than 'it') and found the bushel basket empty.  
In a panic he'd rushed to find Clark. It had taken time, however, for the two of them to explain the situation to the Kents, and then more time for Mr. Kent to yell at them while Mrs. Kent called the police.  
Now they were back at his house, and in spite of the half-used can of formula he could tell from Sheriff Adams' expression that she was more than a little bit skeptical about their story.  
"Pete's telling the truth, Sheriff," Clark chimed in. He shot an apologetic look at his parents, standing like sentinels by the stove. "I know it sounds crazy, and I know we should have come to you guys first, but I swear we thought we were doing the right thing."  
"Clark, be honest, man, it was my stupid idea." Pete ran his hands over his eyes. He'd been so sure his course of action had been the right one, so sure he was being the hero. And he hadn't even been able to protect a little baby. He should have insisted Clark take the baby with him back to the Kents. He should have taken her upstairs with him when he went to bed instead of leaving her in the warmer spare bedroom. Should have.  
The sheriff stared hard at each boy in turn. "Look, I don't know what you two are trying to pull, but I'm not in the mood. We had another armed robbery over in Lowell last night, and my men are stretched thin as it is."  
Jonathan Kent stepped forward and laid a work-worn hand on Pete's shoulder.  
"Sheriff, I've known Pete since he was a little boy. He's not a liar. Couldn't you send someone out to investigate where he and Clark say they found this baby?"  
The older woman snorted. "I'd feel better if there was a report out about it. But nobody in this county or any of the surrounding ones is missing a kid." She arched one brow. "I don't suppose you've got any more evidence?"  
Clark and Pete shared a dull look.  
"We, uh, left the jacket where it was."  
"Of course you did," Adams sighed. "Diapers?"  
It took Pete a minute to figure out what she meant. "No, I was using towels, and I washed the dirty ones before I went to bed last night. God, if anything has happened to that kid because of me."  
Sheriff Adams flipped her notebook closed and stood. "All right, I'll get someone out to the site as soon as I can spare 'em. And I'll keep my eyes and ears open." She paused before the front door. "But I'm warning you two-this better not be another one of your wild goose chases. Because if you're wasting my time you're both gonna wish you'd stayed out there in those woods."  
As they heard the sheriff's patrol car start up Pete stood.  
"Finally. Clark, let's go."  
"Hold it, you two." Clark's father held up his hand. "You're not going anywhere."  
Mrs. Kent looked at them sadly. "What were you boys thinking? That child could be in real danger."  
Clark only stared down at his size-fourteen shoes.  
Pete shook his head. "We're wasting time. Look, I know we screwed up, and I promise you, once we find her you can call my parents, take my car keys, whatever. I'll even ground myself. But I'm really freaked out and worried right now and I need Clark's help." He looked from one Kent parent to the other. "Please."  
"Pete, of course Clark will help, and we will, too." Martha stood and hugged her son's friend. "We just wished this had never happened."  
"You and me both, Mrs. Kent," Pete sighed. "You and me both."  
  
It was close to midnight and Clark sat up in the loft contemplating what to do next.  
He and Pete had gone into town, stopping in every store so Pete could spread the word and Clark could surreptitiously scan for any signs of the missing child.  
People had looked at them like they were nuts.  
At noon one of Adams' deputies finally showed up and Pete and Clark led him out to where they had found the baby and the blood-smeared jacket the day before.  
Only now the jacket was gone, too.  
They had gone up and down the bank looking for it, but after an hour the tired, irritated deputy had insisted they give up the search.  
"It could have washed downstream," Pete had protested feebly, but to no avail.  
He and Clark knew perfectly well this would only confirm Sheriff Adams' suspicion that they had made up the whole story.  
"If only we'd thought to take her picture-then we could make flyers," Pete had grumbled after the police car dropped them back downtown. "But I'm not giving up yet. She was real, Clark. You saw her, too."  
"Of course I did. But this whole thing just keeps getting stranger and stranger."  
Clark chewed on his thumbnail. By the time night had begun to fall they had decided to retreat to the Kent farm and regroup. First thing in the morning they would enlist Chloe's help: with her connections at the Ledger they could probably convince the paper to run an item on the search.  
Of course Clark knew that whoever had spirited her away was probably across the state line by now, but he couldn't give up hope.  
He was determined to get her back, both for his own sake and for Pete's.  
They would never be able to live with themselves otherwise.  
  
Joe Butoni had never wanted an exciting life. A wife, some kids, and a steady business for his service station were enough for him. And he had all three.  
Maybe that was why, when he arrived to take over the night shift, he didn't immediately wonder why the day manager wasn't behind the cashier's counter where he should have been. Joe just figured he'd stepped out back for a moment.  
It was also why, when he opened the door to the office and saw an unknown young person standing there, he didn't recognize the threat.  
"What are you.?"  
He didn't get a chance to finish before the bullet hit him.  
  
Lex paused at the top of the loft stairs. As he's expected Clark was sitting on the lumpy sofa, but instead of doing his homework he was staring up at the night sky.  
Lex cleared his throat a little awkwardly.  
"Am I interrupting something?"  
Clark glanced up and smiled half-heartedly.  
"Hey, Lex."  
The older man frowned at his friend's dejected expression. He'd noticed Pete Ross's car in the driveway, and the lights were on in the Kent kitchen, which made it even odder that Clark would be out here by himself.  
"Is this a bad time?"  
"Lex, you wouldn't believe me if I told you," Clark sighed. He pointed to the battered chair opposite the sofa. "But I could really use a fresh ear, if you've got the time."  
"Of course."  
He was expecting to hear another litany of teenage woes from Clark--they tended to center around Lana Lang-but instead listened with growing interest while Clark related a positively gothic tale of abandoned infants, rushing rivers, and incompetent law enforcement.  
When Clark finally finished he looked at Lex expectantly.  
"So what do you make of it?"  
Lex shook his head. "If it were anyone but you telling me this I'd say it strains the realms of credulity."  
"It did happen, Lex, but nobody believes us."  
"Yes, but as I say, this is out there, even for Smallville."  
Lex stood and stretched his arms as he thought.  
He was pleased to be back at LuthorCorp, but so far his father had entrusted him with little real responsibility. There wasn't much intellectual challenge to be had in signing invoices and checking balance sheets. He wouldn't have admitted it, but he liked having puzzles to solve.  
"I hate to say it, Clark, but the most logical explanation is that whoever tried to kill that infant came back and finished the job." Lex frowned. "It was very stupid of Ross to leave her unwatched."  
"It's not Pete's fault-how could he have known someone would walk right in an take her?" Clark protested.  
Lex knew most people in Smallville didn't lock their doors at night, which had always struck him as ill advised. But he didn't bother pointing that out.  
Clark sighed heavily. "The bigger question in my mind is--who would want to hurt an infant? If they didn't want her there are hundreds of people out there who would have adopted her."  
"She must have posed a threat to someone."  
Clark rubbed his hands through his hair. "C'mon, Lex, she's a newborn. How could a newborn be a threat to anyone?"  
Lex could think of any number of reasons. But Clark had more faith in humanity than he did.  
"It's an interesting question, but one I doubt you'll get an answer to, Clark. I'm sorry."  
"Yeah."  
Lex knew an exit cue when he heard one.  
"Look, call me tomorrow and I'll see what I can do to help."  
Clark stood up, too. "Thanks, Lex-I appreciate that."  
"I was going to stop in and say hello to your parents, but."  
"Not a good idea just now. They made Pete call his parents and explain what happened, and last I heard they were on the cordless trying to keep Pete's mom from jumping on the next plane home."  
"Ah. Another time, then."  
Clark grinned, but the smile still didn't reach his eyes. "Thanks for dropping by, Lex."  
"Anytime."  
Lex shook his head bemusedly as he walked back out to his silver Porsche. The weather had warmed back up a bit-it was too late in the year for an Indian summer, but it was almost too warm for his jacket. It wouldn't last, though.  
He glanced out over the Kents' fields, wondering if he should offer some financial assistance so they could hire more help to bring in the crops. Of course Mr. Kent probably wouldn't go for that, but he could still offer.  
Lex unlocked the driver's side door and slid into the cool leather interior of his car.  
He and Jonathan Kent had made a little bit of progress in the last few weeks, but it wasn't enough for Lex.  
His father thought he wanted Kent's approval, and mocked him for it. But what Lex really wanted was his respect. He wanted Jonathan Kent to look him in the eye and treat him as an equal.  
As he inserted the key into the ignition and both the radio and the engine roared to life he couldn't help but smile to himself. One of these days he'd get that respect. He just had to be patient.  
Lex threw the car into reverse and glanced over his shoulder to back out of the Kents driveway. And froze.  
Lying on his backseat was something that hadn't been there before.  
He sat very still with the ignition still running for a moment, wondering what it was. It seemed too lumpy to be a bomb or a weapon, but Lex didn't have a whole lot of experience with such things.  
After a moment, however, he realized the object was emitting its own high-pitched noise.  
It was too irregular to be the finely tuned motor and too off-key to be the stereo.  
And Lex, who was never surprised, almost laughed.  
"I'll be damned." 


	4. Ch 4

Clark couldn't help but stare open-mouthed as he peered through the window at Lex's backseat.  
"Is that what you were looking for?" Lex was standing to one side, smiling bemusedly at him. He had gone right back out to the barn and insisted Clark come outside with him without saying why.  
Now Clark tried to maintain his composure.  
"I think so. They all kind of look a like."  
"How many infants can there be in Smallville that appear, disappear, and then reappear?" Lex asked as he opened the door.  
Clark very carefully reached in and picked up the baby. She was still wrapped in the blankets from Pete's bushel basket, but her small face was squinched up as she howled angrily. He gingerly tucked her into the crook of one arm as he had seen Pete do. That quieted her a little, but not much.  
"And unless she can levitate I'd say whoever took her returned her," Lex added.  
Clark shook his head.  
"How.?"  
"I left the driver's side window open. All they had to do was reach inside and unlock the door."  
Clark tried to jiggle the baby a little, but he was so afraid of inadvertently hurting her that the movement did nothing to soothe her. To his immense relief he heard the screen door swing open behind him.  
"Clark? Lex?" His mother's voice called out. "Is something wrong?"  
"Mom, get Pete off the phone." In the darkness Clark held up the squirming bundle. "She's back!"  
Martha Kent hurried down the porch stairs.  
"What on earth.?"  
"Someone left her in my car, Mrs. Kent," Lex explained. "Don't ask me why."  
Clark sighed with relief when his mother took the baby out of his arms. The two young men followed her back into the house.  
Inside the snug warmth of the Kent kitchen Pete was able to rock the baby to sleep, while Martha Kent stood watch and Jonathan looked on with a puzzled frown.  
"None of this makes any sense. Why would someone take her and then return her?"  
"Maybe they realized they did the wrong thing and wanted to make it right," Pete, always the optimist, offered.  
The more pessimistic Lex Luthor, however, shook his head.  
"More likely they had a sudden chance in their plans and figured it would be easier to return her to you two rather than go to the authorities." Lex pointedly ignored the dirty look this statement earned him from Ross.  
"Which means they know both Clark and Pete are involved. Maybe whoever it was has been following you boys." Jonathan rubbed a hand across his chin. "I don't like this at all."  
"But who would want to hurt such a tiny little thing?" Martha was holding on to one of the sleeping baby's small fists, and with a pang Clark remembered that she'd recently lost a baby of her own. As always the memory of his own involvement in that loss made a lump rise in his throat, but he quickly forced it down.  
"I don't know, Martha, but I don't think we should wait to call Sheriff Adams this time. The sooner we get the police in on this, the safer she'll be," Jonathan told her.  
"Guess the sheriff'll have to believe me this time, huh?" Pete grinned. He glanced down at the sleeping baby. "Isn't that right, Rosie?"  
While his father went to call the police Clark frowned at his friend.  
"That's another thing, Pete-how come you got to name her?"  
Pete rolled his eyes. "Geez, Clark, I just wanted to call her something other than 'baby', and 'Rose' was the first name I thought of. It was my grandmother's name."  
Martha smiled. "It's a very nice name for a little girl. Why don't I take her upstairs: she can sleep in our bed until the authorities get here."  
Clark moved to follow his mother upstairs, but Lex held him back for a moment.  
"I want you to call me tomorrow, Clark, and give me an update."  
Pete glared at the bald man. "Why?"  
Clark made an exasperated sound, but Lex remained unruffled.  
"Because I'm involved now, too-she was left in my car, after all. And perhaps I can be of some help locating her family."  
Clark shot Pete a sharp glare. "That would be great, Lex, thanks."  
He opened the screen door for the Luthor heir, and once Lex was out of sight he rolled his eyes at Pete.  
"Look, Pete, I know you don't like the guy, but he just wants to help."  
"Luthors never 'just want to help,' Clark."  
Clark suddenly felt very tired.  
"I'm not going to get into this with you, Pete. But next time try and cut the guy a little slack, OK?"  
Pete had opened his mouth to argue when Jonathan reappeared.  
"Sheriff Adams is out on a call, but she'll come by as soon as she can."  
  
When neither boy responded he glanced from his son to his friend and back again.  
"Somethin' wrong?"  
"Everything's fine, Dad. I'm going to see if Mom needs any help with Rose."  
Clark stomped up the stairs, annoyed that Pete had once again thrown the Luthors in his face. Clark knew better than anyone that Lex was far from perfect, but that didn't mean the guy didn't try.  
Clark didn't appreciate being stuck in the middle of the ongoing feud between the Ross' and the Luthors.  
But since he valued both friendships, what else could he do?  
  
Chloe refilled her cup from the coffee pot on the stove and glared at her two male friends.  
"If you guys needed help, why didn't you ask the other day?"  
Pete glanced at Clark, who only shrugged.  
"We weren't sure if it was safe to tell anyone."  
"Which, considering someone tried to kidnap the baby, was probably true," Lana Lang said thoughtfully.  
The four teenagers were gathered around the Kent's kitchen table. It was early morning, but Clark's parents were already out in the fields. Pete had agreed to stay with the baby in the house so the Kents wouldn't loose any more time on the harvest.  
Lana shook her head. "You two are lucky Sheriff Adams didn't throw the book at you."  
"I think she was just annoyed to be proved wrong. But," Clark took another sip of his coffee, "she really seemed more distracted than anything else. I mean, she didn't show up here until, what, three AM? And then she only took a few notes and asked my parents if they'll hang on to Rose until she can get to the bottom of things."  
"Yeah, well, she was probably more than a little distracted. There was a homicide last night," Chloe supplied as she sat down. As a reporter, she made it her business to always know everything first.  
"Here in town? What happened?"  
"Old Mr. Butoni over at the Gas N' Shop was shot. They think he interrupted a break in. His night manager got clubbed over the head. He's in the hospital with a concussion."  
"Man, that's rough-Butoni was a nice old guy." Pete frowned. "What is going on with this town?"  
"Is that a rhetorical question?" Chloe asked. "Because it looks like a garden-variety robbery, no meteor freaks involved."  
"And there was that hold-up over in Lowell the other day, and in Grandville before that," Lana said. "They're all probably connected."  
"Looks like Lowell County's got its own little crime spree," Chloe agreed. "Of course, that still leaves us with where that fits in."  
She pointed to the living room, where Pete had laid the baby on a blanket. Rose was too little to play with anything, but she was awake and waving her hands as if that amused her enough for the time being. Clark had been a little surprised when, after some initial cuddling, neither Chloe nor Lana had expressed much interest in the baby. OK, to be honest it didn't surprise him in Chloe, but he'd kind of wanted to see Lana with Rose. Apparently girls weren't as crazy about babies as he'd been led to believe. Another of his illusions about the opposite sex shot down.  
Meanwhile, Chloe's attitude was clearly rubbing Pete the wrong way.  
"Rose isn't an 'it,' she's a 'she,'" Pete corrected coldly.  
Chloe made a face. "Sorry. Geez."  
"Pete takes his responsibility really seriously," Clark explained.  
"Of course you do-you found her," Lana nodded at Pete. "I think it's sweet."  
"I found her, too," Clark said.  
"And what makes you think Rose is connected to those robberies?" Pete asked Chloe.  
"You think it's a coincidence that she turns up right in the middle of it?" The blond girl laughed shortly. "C'mon, Pete, don't be naive."  
Clark felt he should change the subject before Chloe and Pete came to blows.  
"When I spoke to Lex this morning he said he'd put up reward money for whoever locates her family. You should put that in your article."  
"Hey, I don't even know if I'm going to write this article," Chloe retorted. "I don't usually do human interest stories."  
Lana smiled at her roommate. "Chloe, get real-you said on the way here that it would be a front page byline. Of course you'll do it."  
Chloe looked irritated. "Lana, that was a private conversation."  
Rose made a squeaking sound, and Pete went to check on her.  
"She's right, though-it would look better on your resume than the Wall of Weird," Clark hedged.  
Pete came back into the kitchen with Rose in his arms. As always the baby improved his mood: he smiled apologetically at his friend.  
"You'd be doing us a big favor, Clo. Me most of all."  
Chloe looked from one friend to the other, and sighed.  
"OK, fine, I'll do it. The Ledger editor owes me a favor, anyway." She held up a hand. "But it's not going to be a fluff piece. I'm not gonna gloss over anything."  
"And maybe it'll generate some leads," Lana reflected. "Maybe someone who knows something, saw something, will come forward."  
Clark smiled at her.  
"You've been hanging around Chloe too long."  
Lana smiled back. "What can I say-she makes life more interesting."  
  
Jonathan was in the hay field struggling to get the reaper running when a rush of air behind him announced his son's arrival.  
"Let me give you a hand."  
With on quick movement Clark freed up the jammed gear and the enormous machine roared back to life.  
Jonathan wiped a gloved hand across his forehead. "Thanks. I would have been here all day."  
Clark looked a little guilty. "We're falling behind, huh?"  
"We'll catch up. Don't worry."  
But Clark kept frowning.  
"Dad, I wanted to ask you something.are you and Mom OK with having Rose here until Adams' decides what to do with her?"  
"It's a bit more work, son, but with Pete staying with us we'll manage."  
"No, that's not what I mean. I.I'm worried. That it will hurt Mom. Remind her.I dunno."  
"Clark, your mother is just fine. She's a strong lady." Jonathan clasped his son's shoulder. "That baby came to you and Pete for a reason, just like you came to us for a reason. She obviously needs protecting, and we Kents have a lot of experience in that line. It will all work out, you'll see."  
"You really think so?"  
"I know so. Now let's see how much of this hay we can get down and stacked before lunch." 


	5. Ch 5

"That's right, Chloe--$25,000. No, only half of it's mine. LuthorCorp is putting up the other half." Lex glanced up from his phone call to see Clark Kent standing in the doorway to his study. He waved the younger man in.  
"You can mention my name or not, Chloe. I leave that at your discretion. Just call if you have any more questions. Goodbye."  
Lex hung up the phone and grinned at his friend.  
"That was Chloe. She's not letting any grass grow under her feet with this 'lost baby' story. She's shooting for tomorrow evening's edition. Very ambitious."  
Clark grabbed a chair and sat down. "We convinced her it was a good career move. Did I hear right, though? Twenty-five grand is a lot of money, even for you."  
Lex put his feet up on his desk. "Not really. This is a good cause."  
Clark looked at him skeptically. "And you got your dad to pony up half?"  
"Let's say I convinced him of the PR value. How're things at home?"  
"Oh, we're getting back into the swing of things. Harvest's back on track, and Pete's managing fine with Rose."  
Lex tipped his head to one side.  
"I have to say, Ross is surprising me. I wouldn't have pegged him as the 'Mr. Mom' type."  
"He isn't, usually. But finding her the way we did, I think that really got to Pete."  
"And to you."  
Clark ducked his head slightly. "Yeah, me, too, I guess."  
"It was kind of Sheriff Adams to let you hang on to her a little longer."  
"Not really. My folks still have the foster parent papers on file with the county from when Ryan stayed with us. And apparently Social Services has got more kids than they can place as it is."  
Lex stood up. "Don't sell yourself short, Clark. No child could ask for a better home than with your family. And you wait and see-once Chloe's article appears people from all over the state will be trying to adopt her."  
"I sure hope so." Clark was quiet for a moment as he stared out the leaded-glass windows at the Luthor gardens. "Although ideally I'd like to give her back to her parents."  
"It was probably her parents who dumped her in the first place."  
"No, I don't think so, Lex."  
"Clark, not all parents are as loving as yours. There are some out there who would make my father look like parent-of-the-year."  
Lex could see Clark struggling with what he'd said. On the one hand, Lex knew Clark had been adopted, and knew little of where he came from or why he'd been abandoned. He couldn't help but wonder if this whole experience was hitting his friend too close to home. On the other, Lex also knew that it took a lot more than biology to make a good parent. Some, unfortunately, let their ulterior motives take precedence over the best interests of the child. Look at how his father had left his half- brother Lucas to languish in foster care for most of his life.  
Lionel had said Lucas was a sociopath. Lex wasn't entirely convinced that was true, but certainly Lucas had more than his share of personality quirks. But if Lucas had had people like the Kents' to turn to, who was to say he wouldn't have turned out more like Clark?  
"You don't suppose there's any chance your parents or the Ross' might choose to keep Rose, do you?" Lex finally settled on asking.  
"Uh, I doubt it. The Ross' have raised five kids of their own-they're already grandparents a couple of times over. And my folks."  
Lex didn't bother filling in the words for Clark. Lex had never told his friend that he had known about the much-desired but now-lost Kent baby. Dishonest, perhaps, but Lex saw no way to bring it up now without Clark asking awkward questions.  
"Well, we'll have to wait and see what Sheriff Adams and Chloe's story turn up," Clark shrugged.  
"Of course. In the meantime, if there's any help you need, or anything for the baby, just let me know."  
"Will do."  
Clark walked over to the library door, but paused again before turning the knob.  
"And I do think you're wrong, Lex. A lot of things could have happened in that family. I think whoever left Rose by the river didn't have any choice."  
Lex raised his eyebrows slightly, remembering the blood-smeared jacket allegedly found (and then lost) at the scene. But out of deference to his friend he kept silent.  
  
"Pete, if that kid spits up on my computer so help me."  
Chloe was peering over the monitor of her green Alienware desktop. Pete, who had Rose tucked into one arm, rolled his eyes at her, but went ahead and passed the baby to Clark just in case.  
The Torch office was unusually quiet without students filling the halls outside. But with only a few days of Fall Break left all three staffers had decided to meet and compare notes on the "case," as Chloe called it.  
The "case" herself, meanwhile, blew spit bubbles while Clark carefully balanced her in his arms. He was getting better-Pete had complained that Clark handled Rose like the little girl was a football, so he was trying to be more gentle with her.  
Chloe watched his struggles with an amused expression.  
"You know, there is that high school for teen mothers over in Lowell. If one of you guys ends up keeping her I'm sure they could make room."  
"Very funny, Chloe," Pete scowled. "So what did you turn up from the county registrar?"  
The blond girl hastily punched up the right file.  
"OK, there have been one hundred and ninety eight live births in Lowell County in the last three months; one hundred and two of those were female."  
Pete whistled. "That many?"  
"I guess all that fresh air is good for more than corn," Chloe smirked. "Anyway, I cross-checked both the parents' and the children's names with recent warrants, missing persons, what have you, and nothing turned up."  
"But we figured she came from somewhere outside the county anyway," Clark reminded his friends. "What about Metropolis, Pete?"  
"Unfortunately their registrar's security is a lot tighter than the county's," Pete sighed. "They wouldn't give me the time of day by phone unless I could fax them something to prove it was official business. But I did get the Metropolis P.D. to be straight with me, and they haven't had any reports of missing babies, either."  
"So it must have been the parents who tried to get rid of her," Chloe reasoned. "Anyone else would have reported it."  
"You sound like Lex," Clark scolded.  
"I'm going to forget you said that. Anyway, the article comes out tomorrow night, and, Pete, that picture you took is going to run front page. In the meantime I thought I'd post some stuff on the website."  
Pete frowned. "I don't want Rosie on your Wall of Weird, Chloe, even the one in cyberspace."  
"Not the Wall, dummy-that's strictly for meteor-related news. But what you guys said about the missing jacket."  
"The missing bloody jacket," Clark corrected.  
"Fine, the missing, bloody jacket makes me think there's a lot more going on here than meets the eye. Assault, maybe, or even murder. I thought I'd run it up the conspiracy theory flagpole and see if anyone salutes."  
"What're you thinking of as a scenario?"  
Chloe leaned back in her task chair. "Well, that stretch of woods is pretty inaccessible except on foot. I think she must have come down the river, at least a little ways, which means she could have been dumped anywhere from the Loeb Bridge to the LuthorCorp plant."  
"That jacket was pretty puffy and the water was low-I guess it could have worked like that," Pete said a little skeptically. "But what's really weird is someone taking her out of my house and then leaving her in Lex Luthor's Porsche."  
"I haven't really figured that part of it out," Chloe admitted.  
"Lex's car was parked in front of my house-if whoever did it wasn't from around here he or she wouldn't have known that was Lex's car, and not ours." Clark frowned. "They might have thought they were returning her to me."  
"But why you and not me? They didn't want to return to the scene of the crime?" Pete asked him.  
"I don't know." In Clark's arms the baby made a hiccoughing noise and started to cry. "Uh, Pete?"  
Pete glanced at his watch. "Oh, yeah, it's feeding time. Sorry, Rosie- almost forgot." He produced a bottle of formula from his backpack, deftly unscrewed the lid, and popped it in the microwave.  
Chloe looked at him with mild disgust. "Boy, are you two ever whipped."  
"Hey, if you'd rather let her yell."  
"No, no, by all means feed her," Chloe waved a hand absently.  
Clark tested the milk for heat (normally he used his heat vision, but of course he couldn't with Chloe present) and then gave the bottle to Rose.  
As the infant sucked greedily Clark glanced over at his editor.  
"You wait and see, Chloe-some day when you have kids Pete and I are coming over to laugh at how you take care of them. See how you like it."  
"Me with kids." Chloe laughed. "That'll be the day, Clark Kent. That'll be the day." 


	6. Ch 6

Normally Lana Lang didn't get spooked working alone at the Talon late at night. The coffeehouse had been her idea; she'd helped oversee construction, and now she spent a good portion of her waking hours here.  
The movie theater upstairs, sure, that was a little spooky in the dark, but that was due mainly to a frightening incident she'd had there a few months before.  
However, like all the small business owners in Smallville she was only too aware of the recent string of thefts that had culminated in murder. The police still didn't have any leads, and though there hadn't been any more robberies Lana couldn't help but wish she'd asked Chloe or Clark to stay and help her close.  
Especially when she heard a weird metallic scraping as she wiped down tables.  
As she listened carefully, however, she realized that the sound was coming from the back of the building, not from anywhere inside.  
She eased open the swinging door to the storage room behind the main counter: the lights were still on there, and the sight of neatly lined up coffee tins and a tray of unsold baked goods comforted her.  
When she heard the noise again she pressed her ear to the back door, but couldn't make out anything clearly through the metal plate. There were security lights in the alley that should have come on if someone was out there, but then downtown Smallville was so dead this time of night no one would notice them anyway.  
Lana grabbed a sturdy broom in one hand, wishing the new security system Lex Luthor had ordered after the robberies had already been installed.  
Feeling frightened, and more than a little silly for being frightened, she carefully opened the back door and peeked out into the alley.  
At first she didn't see anything. There weren't any cars; no hulking figures lurked in the shadows. She took a deep breath to calm her nerves.  
Then looking to the right she saw the source of the noise-one of the large dumpsters was open on its squeaky hinges, and the one next to it stood open as well. A slightly built figure was rifling through the garbage.  
Lana winced at the pathetic sight. She knew some local business owners padlocked their dumpsters to prevent such activities, but she hadn't thought it necessary. Smallville didn't really have any street people.  
She didn't put her makeshift weapon down, but she lowered it to her side so she looked less threatening, and cleared her throat.  
"Hey."  
Lana hadn't raised her voice, but the other person was startled nonetheless. The lid slammed shut and Lana found herself face to face with a girl about her own age. In the dim lighting she could see the girl was jacketless in the cold night. She looked poised to run.  
  
"I didn't mean to frighten you, I sorry," Lana said quickly. "But if you're hungry I can give you something to eat. There's nothing in there but paper cups and coffee grounds anyway."  
The girl stared at her suspiciously, as if still trying to decide whether to run or not. She was thin and small, and spiky hair stuck out from her head in several different directions, but Lana still couldn't get a good look at her face.  
"Look, I promise I'm not going to hurt you. I manage this place, so it's OK about the dumpsters, really. Hang on a sec." Lana kept the door propped open with her foot but reached back into the storage room. Finding a paper bag she hastily filled it with day-old muffins and bagels. She also grabbed the pink sweater she had hung on the pegboard next to her purse.  
"If you're hungry you should eat something." Lana held out the bag, and after a moment the other girl snatched it out of her hands. She didn't open it, though.  
Wondering if she was doing the right thing Lana then held out her sweater.  
"It's cold out here, so why don't you take this."  
"Can't." The voice was flat and empty, not at all like a young girl should sound.  
"Yes, you can. You shouldn't catch cold. Please." Lana tried to smile winningly, and after a moment the other girl stepped forward slightly and took the sweater from her hand.  
In doing so, however, she came more fully into the light, and Lana gasped.  
The girl had a large, swollen lump on one side of her forehead. It looked like she had tried to clean the wound, but there were still flecks of dried blood against her pale skin. She also had a black eye and a split lip, which looked recent, too.  
Lana's reaction was the worse thing she could have done-the other girl instantly recognized the horror in her expression and, before Lana could stop her, bolted away into the night.  
Feeling a little dizzy, Lana briefly contemplated running after her. She reluctantly decided against it. There was no telling where the girl might be headed, or if whoever had inflicted the damage might be waiting for her.  
Lana stepped back into the Talon and carefully closed the door behind her, making sure to lock it.  
Then she did what she usually did when she needed help.  
She called Clark.  
  
Clark refilled the coffee mug from the urn on the counter and walked back over to where Lana was sitting.  
"Here. I think it's still hot."  
Lana smiled at him. "Thank, Clark. Good thing I hadn't emptied that yet."  
While she drank he watched his ex-girlfriend closely. She looked none the worse for her experience: in fact, even on the phone she'd sounded much more concerned about the girl than about herself. But Clark was still worried. Lana didn't always handle crises well.  
Before he could bring up the subject again, however, Sheriff Adams pushed open the kitchen door and stepped into the dining area.  
Lana stood abruptly. "Did you find anything?"  
The older woman shook her head. "Nope. You really should have had locks on those dumpsters, you know."  
Lana looked away, but not before Clark saw her roll her green eyes. He cleared his throat.  
"What about fingerprints?"  
"Fingerprints? On a dumpster accessible to the public? That would be a waste of time, don't you think, Mr. Kent?"  
Clark sighed. He knew Adams was a good cop, but truth be told he wished she were willing to think outside the box more often.  
One of the deputies appeared behind the sheriff, holding up a crumbled paper bag with the Talon logo on it. "We found this two blocks away. It's full of crumbs."  
Adams looked at Lana with raised eyebrows. "That what you gave her?"  
"Yes. She looked so hungry."  
"I know you meant well, Miss Lang, but you shouldn't have taken the risk, not with a murderer on the loose. You sure you don't want me to contact Mr. Luthor?"  
"No. I'm fine and the Talon's fine. No need for Lex to rush back from Metropolis. Frankly I'm a lot more worried about the girl. What if someone's hurting her? You didn't see her face."  
Clark laid a hand on Lana's shoulder as the sheriff stepped back outside with her deputy. Before he could think of something comforting to say, however, Lana looked at him sharply.  
"Clark, I didn't want to say anything while the sheriff was here because she probably wouldn't believe me. But I don't think she was just some street kid. I think she might have been Rose's mother."  
"Rose's.why?"  
Lana shook her head. "I don't know. She just looked so young, and so scared.I just have this feeling. And why else would she be running even though she's hurt?  
"I don't know, Lana." Clark chewed his lip. "But I promise you we'll find out."  
  
"Well, if Lana is right Rose's mom wouldn't be the first teenage girl to dump her baby." Chloe was once again sitting behind her computer, but this time only she and Clark occupied the Talon office. Pete had wanted to come, but the baby was colicky and he didn't want to leave her alone.  
"God, that's horrible," Clark told her.  
"It is, but it's understandable. They're young, they're alone, they panic. You know, some cities have programs now where women can leave their babies at a hospital or a church with no questions asked."  
"But who beat her up? Her parents?"  
"Who knows?" Chloe typed quickly as she sorted through her files. "I ran Lana's description back through my sources."  
Clark grabbed the other office chair and sat down. "Did you get a hit?"  
"I'm not sure." She waited for a moment while the printer spit out a page, then handed it to her friend.  
"I found a Jane Doe who delivered a baby girl at Metropolis General six weeks ago. She checked herself out the next day against doctors' advice and disappeared. The address she gave was fake."  
Clark arched his eyebrows as he read. "And no one filed a missing person report?"  
"The hospital staff wanted to, but they couldn't prove she was a minor. If she wasn't, then the police don't have a case. Adults can check themselves in and out of the hospital at will, even if it risks their health."  
"But teenagers can't." Clark thought for a moment. "What do we do next?"  
Chloe stood and stretched. "We can't do much without a name. But tomorrow I'm going to start calling Metropolis halfway houses and shelters, see if anyone is missing a teenage girl and a baby."  
"Do you think they'd tell us if they are?"  
"I think I can make a convincing case she might be in danger. Someone gave her that black eye, Clark. Even if she isn't Rose's mother, we need to find her and make sure she's OK."  
"Yeah, we do." Clark paused and picked up that morning's copy of the Smallville Ledger. Chloe's story had indeed made the front page, although not the headline. But there was a nice photo of the baby in the lower left- hand corner. On Sheriff Adams' orders Chloe had left out specific details of how the baby was found, but there was contact information and news of the LuthorCorp reward.  
"Well, if your story doesn't shake more information loose I don't know what to do next."  
"Oh, don't worry Clark-the editor said he'd going to put Rose's story out on the AP wire service. Lots of people will hear about it."  
"I sure hope so. I don't know how Pete will react if lots of people start coming forward, though. He doesn't even believe Lana's story."  
Chloe crinkled her nose. "He's really attached to Rose, isn't he?"  
"You know Pete-way too soft-hearted for his own good."  
Chloe smiled gently. "I could say the same about you, Clark."  
"Mom and Dad are making sure I stay realistic about the whole thing, though. If we can find Rose a good, safe home, even if it's not with her biological family, then we'll have to do it."  
"Don't forget-you were adopted and you turned out OK. I only had one parent and I turned out OK. Rose will be, too."  
  
Clark sighed heavily. "Now we just need to convince Pete." 


	7. Ch 7

"Here's one all the way from Star City. Look, they even sent a picture." Martha Kent held out the picture of a smiling couple so Pete could see it clearly.  
"A lot of them sent pictures," Clark nodded as he pried open another envelope.  
Pete glanced at the small mountain of mail in the center of the Kent kitchen table. Chloe's story in the Ledger had drawn people from all over Kansas (and as far away as the coast) who wanted to adopt Rose.  
He rubbed his temples. Five days ago he and Clark had found the little girl. On Monday classes at Smallville High resumed, and the day after that his parents returned from vacation. And yet he didn't feel like they were any closer to a resolution than they'd been that day in the woods.  
"I really hoped that story would turn up information about where she came from. I mean, these people all sound nice, but it isn't like I even have the right to choose a family for her."  
"I think you do, Pete-you've taken such good care of her I'm sure Child Services will listen to your recommendation." Martha hopped up to check one of the pots simmering on the stove.  
Yesterday she and her son had stripped the garden down to the soil, but for her the work had only begun. The pots of jam and jars of cooked vegetables she'd produce would both help keep the Kent's fed and be something they could sell in farmer's markets all winter. But first there would be long, tedious days of chopping, cooking, and canning.  
Clark glanced over at the living room, where his father was taking a well-deserved break from the fields. He'd volunteered to give Rose her noon bottle, but Clark could see his father's sandy head nodding slightly as he tried not to doze. What his dad really needed, Clark knew, was to go to bed for a week. But he consoled himself with the thought that most of the hay, corn, and soy were harvested. Buyers from Metropolis and Gotham City had already hauled away most of it. Just a few more evenings of shaping haystacks and filling grain bins in the barn and they'd be done for another year.  
And if they were lucky they'd break even.  
"Lana and Chloe are still working the runaway angle. They were going to drive into Metropolis this morning," he reminded his friend.  
"Like that matters. Whoever dumped her shouldn't be allowed to have her back."  
"Pete!" Martha glanced up from her pots and pans in surprise at Pete's heated tone.  
"I mean it, Mrs. Kent. At first I was willing to think maybe there were extenuating circumstances. But now, when Rose is sleeping, I watch her and all I can think is, what if Clark and I hadn't been there? What if the weather had gotten worse? What if an animal had gotten to her?"  
Martha shuddered visibly. "Don't say things like that, Pete."  
"You don't know what whomever left her was thinking," Clark reminded his friend.  
"And I don't care anymore. Clark, even your parents had the sense to send you someplace they knew something about, and they weren't even human."  
Clark's father spoke up from the living room. "Pete, I know you're angry, but it's this little girl you need to be thinking about now. Life has already dealt her more than her fair share of trouble. But getting riled up about it all over again sure isn't going to do her any good."  
Pete sighed heavily and curled his shoulders inward a little. "I know you're right, but I can't help how I feel. And I can't help not being happy about sending her away again."  
Clark shoved another stack of letters across the table. "C'mon, Pete. Let's open a few more. Maybe the perfect family is somewhere in here, just waiting."  
"Yeah. Maybe."  
But even as Pete opened another envelope Clark could see his friend didn't believe his own words.  
  
Stuckey's Bar was on the south side of Metropolis, not too far from the area once known as Suicide Slum. Now the area was home to condominium complexes and upscale sports bars, but only on the well-lit main drags. Off on the side streets, and close to the docks, the area still showed its working class roots. Longshoremen, factory workers on the graveyard shift, and the unemployed made up Stuckey's clientele. And, of course, the kind of men that wouldn't tell you how they made their livings even if you asked. And you'd better not ask.  
The bartender didn't even try to make chitchat with any of the men sitting at the bar. Instead he listed to the local newscast on the TV mounted on the wall over his head.  
".And in local news the plight of an abandoned infant found in the rural town of Smallville has raised the interest of well-known philanthropists Lionel and Lex Luthor. A statement from LuthorCorp's public relations office reads, 'LuthorCorp has made it its mission to respond to the needs of the family. The Luthor family is only too happy to offer a $25,000 reward for information leading to the reuniting of the infant with her family. Interested parties should contact the Smallville Sheriff's Department.' In other news."  
One of the bar patrons chuckled oddly, and the bartender glanced at him.  
"Something funny, young feller?'  
The man had greasy blond hair and an unkempt, unshaven appearance. He looked a little too young to be in the bar in the first place, but he had produced the requisite ID.  
"Nah. Just I was in Smallville the other day, is all."  
"Huh."  
"Nice town." The young man smiled blearily. "Reckon I might go back there one of these days."  
"Uh huh." Indifferent, the bartender went back to wiping glasses with a dirty rag. But his patron continued to stare at the television screen.  
"Yep. I think I'll have to go back there. Yes indeedy."  
  
Tossing another pitchfork full of hay up to his parents, Clark wondered idly if Lana and Chloe had had any luck. He'd called Mr. Sullivan only to find out that the girls weren't back yet. Clark figured they must have found out something, or they wouldn't be still be in Metropolis.  
But he didn't bother discussing all this with either of his parents. In spite of the cool night air both were sweaty and a little breathless.  
They were out in the back field trying to stack the last crop of hay for the winter. They'd brought out both Kent trucks so they could work by the light of the headlamps. The weather service had predicted the first hard frost for that night, and the work had to be done now or never.  
There was an art to making haystacks. If you didn't build them just right they wouldn't shed water, and rain and snow would make them rot. Then you couldn't use it for animal fodder. Clark took on the task of gathering up the hay and mounding it as best he could. Once it got higher than his head his parents climbed up to the top to do the more precise task of rounding the tops.  
Clark didn't get tired, but he tried to adjust his pace to that of his folks as he worked. As always the rhythm and routine made it easy for him to get lost in his own thoughts.  
Which was why he didn't notice someone approaching until they were practically on top of him.  
  
Pete shut off the water and quickly swiped a towel over his wet head. He peeked around the shower curtain.  
Rose was still asleep in the small car seat Lex Luthor had set over, and Pete grinned. He wasn't sure about the etiquette of the situation, but after Rose's first disappearance he wasn't about to leave her alone in the Kent house even while he was in the shower. Rose was too little to know the difference, but he pulled on his sweats before he got out of the bathtub, just in case.  
The steam had made Rose's cheeks as pink as her namesake's, and though Pete had intended to give her a bath he didn't have the heart to wake her up. She'd been so fussy all day that, truth be told, he was glad of the quiet. Maybe he could put her to bed and sneak downstairs to watch television .  
His planning was interrupted by the sound of something breaking. He couldn't be sure, but it sounded like glass.  
Rose's small face scrunched thoughtfully, but to his relief she didn't start to cry.  
Pete could feel his heart thumping in his chest. He knew the Kent's were out working in their fields. There wasn't supposed to be anyone in the house except the him and the baby.  
He cautiously opened the bathroom door, but from his angle he could only see the top of the stairs. And there wasn't anything there.  
He glanced over his shoulder, unsure what to do.  
Then he heard the unmistakable sound of boots crunching on glass downstairs.  
"OK, Rosie, don't panic. I'll take care of everything," Pete said as he quickly picked up the car seat.  
When he stepped empty-handed out into the upstairs hallway Pete listened closely for any more sound. He wished he'd thought to bring his cell phone upstairs, and devoutly hoped the Kent's were already on their way back to the house.  
Inching his way towards the stairs Pete decided to play it cool. He had to remember the baby. Maybe he could scare off whoever it was.  
"Hey, Mr. Kent? Clark? What did you guys break?"  
No answer.  
Pete slipped past the stairwell and headed for the Kent's master bedroom, where he knew there was a phone. He'd almost gotten there when someone grabbed him around the legs, slamming him to the floor.  
Pete struggled with his assailant, who though bigger than him didn't seem that much stronger. In the darkness it was hard to see, but he swung out with his fist and felt the satisfying crunch when it connected.  
He rolled onto his back, but a metallic click stopped him in mid- movement.  
Pete looked up into the barrel of a gun. He tried to stay calm.  
"Look, man, you broke into the wrong house."  
The gun moved closer to Pete's forehead. "Where is it?"  
Pete had a sinking feeling in his chest.  
"Where's what?"  
His assailant, a young man Pete had never seen before in his life, leaned so close he could smell the rank beer on his breath.  
"Don't play dumb, kid. Pete, ain't it? Your name was in the paper. I want the baby."  
"She isn't here. Child Services has her."  
The man swung back the hand holding the gun. When it struck the side of his head Pete tasted blood trickling down the back of his throat.  
"Don't play the hero, Petey. That's how stupid kids like you get killed."  
"You can hit me all you want. She isn't here. Look if you don't believe me."  
The man was kneeling on Pete's chest, but after a moment his weight eased. "Oh, you bet I will."  
"What do you want with her anyway? She's just a baby."  
In the darkness he could still see the other man smile. "No, she's my baby. And I want her back." The man stood up, and Pete acted instinctively.  
He used the tackle he'd learned on the JV squad to slam into the other man's solar plexus. Pete felt the whoosh of air leave the other body, and the even better sound of the gun skittering away down the hall.  
Pete didn't give himself anytime to think before he shoved hard. All he could think about was tossing the man back down the stairs, away from Rose.  
He hadn't counted on being pulled along with him. 


	8. Ch 8

Pete's world turned upside down as he and his assailant rolled down the stairs. His head struck the Kent's banister hard enough to see stars.  
They landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, both winded, both momentarily unable to move. Unfortunately the other man recovered first, and wrapped both hands around Pete's windpipe.  
Pete flailed with his arms, using his hands to try to push his assailant off of him, but the other man had rage and adrenaline working in his favor. Pete began to see white dots swimming in his vision as his breath was choked off and broken glass ground into his back through his t-shirt.  
"I told you, I just want the baby. Tell me where she is and I'll let you go," his opponent panted.  
Pete looked up into the red, contorted face above him. It was hard to talk, but he did his best.  
"Go to hell."  
"Wrong answer."  
Pete had never thought much about dying, but suddenly that seemed like a very real possibility. The funny thing was, that what happened to him didn't seem to matter that much. What mattered to him was keeping this maniac away from the stairs, away from Rose.  
With his vision fading, Pete could only guess at his aim, but he jabbed sharply at where he thought his opponents' eyes would be. The other man let out a howl and released him.  
Gasping for air, Pete rolled away across the Kent's living room floor. He could see the front door tantalizingly close; the evening breeze stirring the curtains through the window Rose's father had broken to get into the house.  
But, bruised and battered, Pete couldn't move fast enough. The other man tackled him, pinning him to the floor. In his hand was a long, jagged piece of broken glass.  
"Stop struggling, kid," the man said, his bravado a little undermined by his own gasping breath. "You're just making it harder on yourself."  
Pete could see the overhead light glint off the shard as it hovered only inches from his face.  
"I don't care what you do to me. You're not getting her. You don't deserve her."  
"Don't tell me what to do!" The other man shrieked, drawing back his arm to strike.  
Pete felt a sudden whoosh of air across his body. A split second later he heard a crash across the room. He sat up dizzily.  
Clark was standing at the bottom of the stairs staring at him. At his feet was the crimpled form of Rose's biological father. There was deep dent in the drywall next to the stairs.  
"Is he still alive?" Pete croaked.  
Clark was staring at him with an expression of mingled awe and relief. He glanced briefly at the still form.  
"Uh, yeah. His heart's still beating."  
"Good." Pete cautiously rubbed his arms and chest, but found no permanent damage. His head ached, though, and his back was beginning to burn as blood seeped from dozens of tiny cuts. "Nice timing, by the way."  
Clark approached him cautiously and gave him a hand to help him up.  
"You were really brave, Pete. That guy was going to stab you. If I'd been a second later."  
"Yeah, yeah, I know. No big deal." Pete smiled crookedly, but his legs began to buckle slightly under him. Clark shoved him onto the couch.  
The crunch of tires on gravel and the pounding of feet on the porch heralded the arrival of the Kent's.  
Jonathan took the situation in at a glance, from broken window to unconscious burglar.  
"I'll call the police."  
As he walked by, however, he gave Pete a firm nod of approval.  
Mrs. Kent was more effusive, however. She took Pete's face in her hands, studying him carefully for injuries in spite of his protests.  
"Mom, Pete's fine, stop smothering him," Clark protested.  
Pete actually didn't mind the attention, but as he looked past his friend's mother he saw a third person standing in the doorway. A thin, slight girl with spiky hair, she was staring at him with eyes full of tears.  
Mrs. Kent followed his line of sight.  
"Peter, this is Charlotte. She's Rose's mother. She saved your life by coming to get us."  
The girl chewed her lip anxiously as Pete stared solemnly back at her.  
"She's been hiding out for a week, Pete," Clark explained. "She was afraid he'd come back for the baby. He was the one who threw Rose in the river."  
"He said he didn't want it," the girl said in a shaky whisper. "He said if I went to the cops he'd kill me, too.so I ran away.and I hid."  
Martha Kent stood and put an arm around the girl. "There, there. It's all over now."  
But Clark was suddenly studying the room with sharp eyes.  
"Pete's where's the baby? Is she OK?"  
Pete found himself suddenly unable to speak, so he just pointed up the stairs.  
  
Clark rushed upstairs, careful to step over the moaning form at its base. He hurried up the dark staircase, scanning the two bedrooms with his x-ray vision.  
He didn't see the baby anywhere, but he did find a gun lying in the hallway. Clark was careful not to touch it, knowing what Sheriff Adams would do to him if he disturbed the chain of evidence.  
But he couldn't help but wish he'd hit the guy a little bit harder for what he'd done to Pete.  
Clark hurriedly stepped into the bathroom, but didn't see Rose. His stomach flipped over.  
Then he heard a slight sound from near the bathtub.  
He moved a pile of wet towels off the laundry hamper and opened it.  
Inside was Rose, still in her car seat, her small head lolling slightly to one side. Her lips worked as if she was dreaming of food.  
She had slept through the whole thing. 


	9. Ch 9

Clark refilled his cup with punch and glanced at the crowd that had gathered in the Talon for Rose's going away party. His folks were there, of course, as well as Pete's, fit and tan from their vacation. But there were also kids he barely knew from school, and some people he didn't know at all.  
"Funny how one life can touch so many others, huh?" Chloe mused as she seized another petit four off the buffet table. "Clark, don't let me keep eating these-they're so good!" She popped the little pink cake in her mouth.  
"It's a nice turnout, and a really nice spread," Clark nodded. "Unfortunately the guest of honor isn't getting much out of it."  
On the other side of the table baby Rose was dozing in her mother's arms as Charlotte talked animatedly with Lana Lang. The bruising on Charlotte's face and neck had started to heal, and her clothes were neat and clean, as were Rose's.  
"I hope you and Pete aren't mad at me."  
Clark raised his eyebrows at Chloe. "Huh? About what?"  
"If Lana and I had gotten back from Metropolis sooner we could have told you who Charlotte Wilkins was, maybe saved Pete from what happened."  
Chloe had indeed struck pay dirt in Metropolis, but of course by now the Kent's had heard the entire story from the source. Charlotte had been only fifteen when she had gotten pregnant, and her parents had sent her away to have her baby. Fearing the authorities would force her to give up her baby Charlotte had run away and been living on the streets when her daughter was born. She had been ecstatic when the baby's father, a petty criminal named Tommy Radcliffe, had found her. But her enthusiasm hadn't lasted long. Tommy drank too much, and treated her badly. Worse, he fell back into his old habit of robbery to support them. Fearing that the Metropolis police were on to him, Tommy had dragged Charlotte and the baby to Lowell County, where he'd robbed a liquor store with Charlotte and his child in the car.  
Fleeing the scene, Charlotte had begged Tommy to let her and her baby go, promising they wouldn't go to the authorities. Tommy had refused, saying that Charlotte obviously didn't love him any more. To punish her he'd stopped on the Lowell Bridge, grabbed the baby (who'd been sleeping, wrapped in her mother's only warm coat) and threw it into the river.  
"Charlotte seems like such a nice girl-I can't believe she'd ever fall in with someone like Radcliffe," Clark mused.  
"She thought she was in love with the guy," Chloe countered. "Women do stupid things when they think they're in love. She probably would have taken the abuse for years if he hadn't tried to hurt her baby."  
"She says she was in the bushes, watching, when Pete found Rose. She's been following us ever since. Guess she thought the baby'd be safe with us."  
"And I think subsequent events have proved her right," Lex Luthor drawled, appearing next to Chloe. "You and Pete risked a lot for that little girl."  
"But I still don't get why she turned up in your car, Lex," Chloe mused aloud.  
"Only because Charlotte thought it must be one of ours," Clark explained. "She seized her chance to get the baby back at Pete's house, but once she heard about the other robberies she knew Tommy was still in town. So she left Rose someplace she knew we would find her."  
"Sheriff Adams says Radcliffe's been charged with first-degree murder for the robbery-homicide," Lex explained. "Not to mention attempted infanticide for throwing Rose into the river, assaulting Pete, breaking and entering.I think it will be a long time before anyone has to see him again."  
"Not long enough for me," Charlotte said as she and Lana approached. Rose was now sound asleep, drooling on her mother's shoulder. "I'm just glad child welfare is giving me a second chance."  
"Do you know where you're going to go? You could stay here," Clark offered.  
Charlotte smiled at him, the first genuine smiled he'd ever seen from her. "Thank you, Clark. But the home I was in before is helping me get a place in Central City. They have a special program there that will help me finish high school and get a job."  
"That sounds great," Lana enthused.  
"I got my little girl back-that's the most important thing." Charlotte smiled down at her baby. "If it hadn't been for all of you, I don't know what would have happened to us."  
"We were happy to do it," Clark said lamely.  
"But you do need to be thinking about your daughter's future," Lex said. He reached into the pocket of his expensive Italian jacket and produced an envelope. "This should help."  
Charlotte opened the envelope and gasped.  
"$25,000? Oh my God, I can't keep this, Mr. Luthor."  
"It's not for you to decide, Ms. Wilkins. If you'll look closely you'll see the bond is in your daughter's name, not yours. It should be maturing about the same time Rose is getting ready for college."  
The girl opened and closed her mouth a few times, clearly awed.  
Clark had to laugh.  
"It's the reward money, isn't it, Lex?"  
"It is."  
"Then you might was well keep it, Charlotte," Lana urged. "You did solve the case, after all. And if you hadn't been watching the Kent house and saw Tommy break in he might have killed Pete."  
Charlotte hung her head. "I only wanted to watch out for my baby. The Kent's were the one who knew what to do. Clark was so brave to go by himself."  
Clark cleared his throat, hoping for a change of subject.  
"Still, the money is Rose's, and Lex hates it when his gifts are refused," Clark joked. "Right, Lex?"  
"Right, Clark."  
  
The guests chatted, and ate cake, and drank the Talon's strong coffee. It was almost like a birthday party, only they would never get to see Rose enjoying her new clothes and toys.  
Clark tried hard to be happy, but he couldn't help the growing ache in his chest. Ever since Charlotte had reappeared Clark had been trying to steel himself for Rose's eventual lose. But now the time had come it was making him miserable.  
Charlotte seemed to recognize this, and finally she cornered him by the serving bar.  
"Clark? I want to talk to you."  
"Sure."  
She smiled softly at him. "Clark, I know this must be hard on you. But I want you to know I am going to be the best mother I can be. You and Pete gave us a second chance. You two are our heroes, Clark."  
Clark blushed, and hated himself for doing so.  
"Thanks."  
"You know, I haven't seen Pete all night," she hedged.  
Clark cleared his throat. "This is kind of hard on him, Charlotte. He really got attached to her."  
"I know that. I can see it when he holds her. But we'd still like to stay goodbye."  
Clark sighed. "Well, you didn't hear it from me, but." He pointing a finger toward the swinging door separating the main room from the storage area.  
"Thank you, Clark." Charlotte stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek.  
  
Pete was sitting on an upturned storage box with his chin on his hands. He'd tried to be upbeat all week, but now that it was getting down to zero hour it was too depressing for him to be at the party. All of Lana's carefully prepared food tasted like sawdust in his mouth.  
"Peter? Can I sit with you for a minute?"  
He looked up to see Charlotte standing in the door. Rose was balanced against her shoulder.  
"Sure, I guess. If you want."  
The girl sat next to him.  
"People are missing you out there."  
"I'm not really in a party mood."  
"Because of me?"  
"No. Well.yeah."  
Charlotte laid her hand on his.  
"Pete, I don't want us to leave on bad terms. I don't want you to a hate me."  
Pete sighed. "I don't hate you. I really wanted to, though."  
Charlotte laughed. "I could tell."  
"You could?"  
"Yeah, the way you hovered over us every time I changed or fed the baby. Like you were hoping I'd screw up."  
He winced. "Sorry."  
"Hey, if I were in your shoes I'd feel the same way. I mean, I put my own baby's life at risk because I trusted some jerk guy. If I'd gone to the cops when I should have."  
"But you did the right thing when it counted."  
"I guess."  
The baby stirred slightly in her sleep, and Charlotte absently patted her back.  
"Are you sure you don't want to join the rest of us? Your folks are saving you some cake."  
Pete shook his head. "Maybe in a little while."  
Charlotte nodded, and stood up. Before she opened the door, however, she paused and turned back to face him.  
"And Pete?"  
"Yeah?"  
"I wanted to tell you that I'm keeping the name you gave her. Her name will always be Rose."  
Pete swallowed the lump in his throat and grinned crookedly.  
"Thanks."  
  
Clark slammed his locker door shut and tossed his backpack over his shoulder. The hallways of Smallville High School thronged with people moving between classes.  
Pete emerged from his physics class and leaned against the row of lockers.  
"Seems a little unreal, doesn't it?"  
"Yeah, a little. Like we're just supposed to forget her and go on with our lives."  
"Well, we kinda are. We don't have to forget her, though." Pete stared at his sneakers for a moment. "Charlotte called last night. She and Rose are settled in their new apartment. She says we can write, if we want."  
Clark studied his friend's neutral expression.  
"Are you going to?"  
Pete shrugged. "Yeah. Kid can't read yet, but someday she might like to hear the whole story."  
"Without the scarier moments," Clark amended. He joined Pete in walking down the hall. "Do you still think we did the right thing?"  
"You mean getting involved in the whole mess? Yeah, I do. I mean, I guess I thought being a hero would be more glamorous, and, I dunno, easier."  
"Tell me about it."  
"But we did a good thing, Clark. We reunited mother and child. It's a Paul Simon song waiting to happen."  
"Pete, don't joke. I know you miss Rose."  
"Of course I do. And I guess I always will. But I wasn't really ready for the whole 'teen father' gig. I got a lot of years ahead of me before I'm ready to settle down for good." Pete winked.  
Clark followed his friend's gaze, and saw a pretty sophomore waiting in the doorway of Pete's English class.  
"Isn't she on the cheerleading squad?"  
"Yep," Pete beamed. As he walked away Pete clapped his friend on the back.  
"The hero thing does have some perks, Clark. And some of us intend to take advantage of them."  
Clark just shook his head and headed for his own class.  
  
The End 


End file.
